Chandra :: Photo Galleryhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/
Chandra Photo Galleryen-usChandra Deep Field South http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2011/cdfs/
A composite image combines the deepest X-ray image with optical and infrared data.4C+00.58http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2010/4c0058/
This image shows the effects of a giant black hole that has been flipped around twice, causing its spin axis to point in a different direction from before.Lyman Alpha Blobshttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2009/labs/
Giant reservoirs of hydrogen gas about 10 billion light years away.HDF 130http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2009/hdf/
This is a composite image showing a small region of the Chandra Deep Field North.GOODS Chandra Deep Field-Southhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2007/goods/
The artist's illustration on the left shows a typical massive galaxy as it would have appeared when the universe was only about a quarter of its current age.Chandra Deep Field-Northhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/felines/
A team of astronomers has been able to determine the amount of iron near supermassive black holes (light blue in illustration on the right) in the centers of distant galaxies. The graphic on the left shows portions of X-ray spectra from a subset of 50 black holes about 9 billion light years away (upper panel), and another group of 22 black holes that are about 11 billion light years away (lower panel). The peaks in the spectra are produced by X-ray emission from iron atoms, and indicate that approximately the same amount of iron was present around black holes 9 billion years and 11 billion years in the past. Similar results from other groups of black holes show that the amount of iron around black holes has not changed significantly over the past 11 billion years. This implies that most of the iron in the galaxies that contain these supermassive black holes was created before the universe was about 2 billion years old, when galaxies were very young.Chandra Deep Field South http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/felines/
A team of astronomers has been able to determine the amount of iron near supermassive black holes (light blue in illustration on the right) in the centers of distant galaxies. The graphic on the left shows portions of X-ray spectra from a subset of 50 black holes about 9 billion light years away (upper panel), and another group of 22 black holes that are about 11 billion light years away (lower panel). The peaks in the spectra are produced by X-ray emission from iron atoms, and indicate that approximately the same amount of iron was present around black holes 9 billion years and 11 billion years in the past. Similar results from other groups of black holes show that the amount of iron around black holes has not changed significantly over the past 11 billion years. This implies that most of the iron in the galaxies that contain these supermassive black holes was created before the universe was about 2 billion years old, when galaxies were very young.Submillimeter Galaxies in the Chandra Deep Field-North (SMG 123616.1+621513)http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2005/smg/
An artist's illustration shows two young galaxies in the process of merging. The merger has triggered a prodigious burst of star formation and is providing fuel for the growth of the galaxies' central supermassive black holes. The inset shows a Chandra image of two central black holes in merging galaxies. Although the black holes appear to be very close in this image, they are actually about 70,000 light years apart. The different colors in the image are due to differences in X-ray absorption by gas and dust around the black holes with blue indicating more absorption than red. Observations indicate that many adolescent merging galaxies and their central black holes underwent a phenomenal spurt of growth 10 billion to 12 billion years ago. This growth spurt may have set the stage for the appearance of quasars, distant galaxies that contain the largest and most active black holes in the Universe.GOODS CDFS 033213.9-275000http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2004/goodsbh/
Three of NASA's Great Observatories - the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Spitzer Space Telescope - have found evidence of a hidden population of supermassive black holes in the universe. Two of these objects appear as X-ray sources (large blue central spots) without optical counterparts in the composite Hubble-Chandra images on the upper and lower left panels. The Chandra-Spitzer (X-ray/infrared) images on the upper and lower right panels demonstrate that these mysterious X-ray sources are also detected at infrared wavelengths. This indicates that the galaxies around these supermassive black holes are heavily obscured by dust. Visible light is absorbed by the dust, which is heated by the absorption and glows at infrared wavelengths. Combined data from Chandra, Spitzer and Hubble should soon yield a much more complete census of the number of black holes in the early universe.GOODS CDFS 033251.6-275212http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2004/goodsbh/
Three of NASA's Great Observatories - the Hubble Space Telescope, the Chandra X-ray Observatory, and the Spitzer Space Telescope - have found evidence of a hidden population of supermassive black holes in the universe. Two of these objects appear as X-ray sources (large blue central spots) without optical counterparts in the composite Hubble-Chandra images on the upper and lower left panels. The Chandra-Spitzer (X-ray/infrared) images on the upper and lower right panels demonstrate that these mysterious X-ray sources are also detected at infrared wavelengths. This indicates that the galaxies around these supermassive black holes are heavily obscured by dust. Visible light is absorbed by the dust, which is heated by the absorption and glows at infrared wavelengths. Combined data from Chandra, Spitzer and Hubble should soon yield a much more complete census of the number of black holes in the early universe.GOODS Chandra Deep Field-Northhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2003/goods/
Chandra's Deep Field North image is the most sensitive or "deepest" X-ray exposure ever made. The faintest sources produced only one X-ray photon every 4 days. More than 500 X-ray sources are present in this high-energy core sample of the early universe. A few are stars in our galaxy, but most of the sources are supermassive black holes in the centers of distant galaxies. If the number of supermassive black holes seen in this patch of the sky is typical, the total number detectable over the whole sky at this level of sensitivity would be 300 million.GOODS Chandra Deep Field-Southhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2003/goods/
Chandra's Deep Field North image is the most sensitive or "deepest" X-ray exposure ever made. The faintest sources produced only one X-ray photon every 4 days. More than 500 X-ray sources are present in this high-energy core sample of the early universe. A few are stars in our galaxy, but most of the sources are supermassive black holes in the centers of distant galaxies. If the number of supermassive black holes seen in this patch of the sky is typical, the total number detectable over the whole sky at this level of sensitivity would be 300 million.Lockman Hole North-Westhttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2003/lockman/
Hot Intergalactic Gashttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2002/igm/
This artistic rendering illustrates how X-rays from a distant quasar dim as they pass through a cloud of the intergalactic gas. Four independent teams of scientists have detected intergalactic gas clouds with temperatures in the range 300,000 to 5 million degrees Celsius by observing quasars with Chandra. The spectrum of the quasar PKS 2155-304 in the inset shows absorption due to oxygen in the hot gas and allows astronomers to estimate the temperature, density and mass of the absorbing cloud. The hot gas appears to lie like a fog in channels carved by rivers of gravity and to form part of a gigantic system of hot gas and dark matter that defines the cosmic landscape. This system is thought to contain more material than all the stars in the universe.Chandra Deep Field South http://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2001/cdfs/
This Chandra image shows that gigantic black holes were much more active in the past than the present. In this deepest X-ray exposure ever made, some of the sources are 12 billion light years away. Most of the objects are active galaxies and quasars powered by supermassive black holes, while other objects are galaxies, and groups and clusters of galaxies. Information from this image will help astronomers understand how dense clouds of gas form galaxies with massive black holes at their centers. The energy bands of the X-rays are color coded, with red representing lower energies, yellow intermediate, and blue the highest energies.Deep Field in Canes Venaticihttp://chandra.harvard.edu/photo/2000/bg/
This Chandra X-ray Observatory image of a 27.7 hour observation of a region in the direction of the constellation Canes Venatici, close to the Big Dipper, shows about 3 dozen X-ray sources. Some of the sources are optically too faint to be seen by telescopes such as the Hubble Space Telescope and the Keck 10 meter telescope in Hawaii and so are only known through this Chandra observation. This new class of sources may represent some of the most distant objects ever detected. If this sample of the sky is typical, tens of millions of such sources must exist.